50 Years Ago
- The prospects for downtown urban renewal grew dimmer yesterday as two of the three leading candidates for the Northampton mayor’s office voiced their opposition to the city’s paying for an expensive urban renewal project. Councilors Harry S. Chapman Jr. and Edward P. Gross both said they were opposed to the proposed $5.5 million Pleasant/River Urban Renewal Project.
- For two and a half hours, Dick Gregory told an overflow crowd of 3,000 in the UMass Student Union ballroom that the whole world was crazy and somebody was going to have to do something. “I predict that in the next 18 months, if the price of sugar keeps climbing like it has for the last 12,” Gregory said, “People will stop pushing dope and start pushing sugar!”
25 Years Ago
- It took salvage crews about two hours Thursday to remove a twin-engine plane from a cornfield next to Riverbank Road onto a flatbed truck. The plane was badly damaged after it skidded into the field Thursday morning. The pilot and his 17-year-old son were uninjured in the accident. They were in town looking at area colleges.
- The owner of a new store on Pleasant Street hopes to attract customers with a range of discounted items, including footwear, clothing, pet food, beauty products and organic food. The store, called Deals & Steals, opened its doors Wednesday at 76 Pleasant St. after moving from its former location on Cottage Street in Easthampton.
10 Years Ago
- As the Three County Fair wound down around 6 p.m. Monday, general manager Bruce Shallcross estimated that the four-day event drew somewhere near 39,500 people. “The best year we had in the past five years was 2010. We hit 39,000,” he said. “This year will be as good as that if not better.”
- Ashfield bedrock will soon have a place in iconic buildings in Boston and New York City, where architects — like good chefs — are opting for “local” ingredients. Boston Public Library will install roughly 4,500 square feet of Ashfield Stone tile flooring in its planned renovation of the Boylston Street lobby entrance, which is to be completed next summer.